Combat continues as ground lines of communication (GLOCs) are the key targets for the Ukrainians. Russian forces begin to dig in to consolidate gains and convert otherwise Ukrainian territory into Russian holdings including annexing part of the Zaporizhia Oblast to exploit the energy production of its nuclear power plant and sell electrical power back to Ukraine.
Subordinate Main Effort—Southern Kharkiv, Donetsk, Luhansk Oblasts (Russian objective: Encircle Ukrainian forces in Eastern Ukraine and capture the entirety of Donetsk and Luhansk Oblasts, the claimed territory of Russia’s proxies in Donbas)
Russian forces did not advance south of Izyum on May 18. The Ukrainian General Staff reported that Russian forces used drones, rockets, and artillery units to support an unsuccessful offensive on Dovhenke - a settlement approximately 30 kilometers south of Izyum.[9] Russian forces are likely aiming to secure access to the Izyum-Slovyansk highway east of the settlement to resume the offensive on Donbas. A satellite image from May 12 released yesterday showed a sunken Russian pontoon bridge approximately seven kilometers southwest of Izyum, which had been previously used by Russian forces to transport heavy artillery in April.[10] Ukrainian forces could have damaged the pontoon bridge given that they had previously destroyed two bridges in the same location on March 27.[11] Damage to the bridge may be hindering Russian drives on Barvinkove southwest of Izyum, although Russian possession of the major highways in the area might be sufficient to support their current level of operations. Russian forces intensified offensive operations in the area of Lyman, likely to gain foothold west of the Siverskyi Donets river.[12]
...Russian military Telegram channels criticized the functioning of the Russian reconnaissance-strike complex (used to identify and attack targets), on the grounds that its centralized approval system hinders Russian artillery from striking Ukrainian positions in time because of delays in securing approval to fire from higher command echelons.[18]
www.understandingwar.org/...
Disinformation has become a central tool in the United States and Russia’s expanding information war. US officials have openly admitted to “using information as a weapon even when the confidence and accuracy of the information wasn’t high,” with corporate media eager to assist Washington in its strategy to “pre-empt and disrupt the Kremlin’s tactics, complicate its military campaign” (NBC, 4/6/22).
In defense of the US narrative, corporate media have increasingly taken to branding realities inconvenient to US information goals as “disinformation” spread by Russia or its proxies.
The New York Times (1/25/22) reported that Russian disinformation doesn’t only take the form of patently false assertions, but also those which are “true but tangential to current events”—a convenient definition, in that it allows accurate facts to be dismissed as “disinformation.” But who determines what is “tangential” and what is relevant, and what are the guiding principles to make such a determination? In this assessment, Western audiences are too fickle to be trusted with making up their own mind.
There’s no denying that Russia’s disinformation campaign is key to justifying its war on Ukraine. But instead of uncritically outsourcing these decisions to Western intelligence officials and weapons manufacturers, and as a result erasing realities key to a political settlement, the media’s ultimate guiding principle for what information is “tangential” should be whether it is relevant to preventing the further suffering of Ukrainian civilians—and reducing tensions between the world’s two largest nuclear powers.
For Western audiences, and US citizens in particular, labeling or otherwise marginalizing inconvenient realities as “disinformation” prevents a clear understanding of how their government helped escalate tensions in the region, continues to obstruct the possibility of peace talks, and is prepared to, as retired senior US diplomat Chas Freeman describes it, “fight to the last Ukrainian” in a bid to weaken Russia.
The New York Times (4/11/22) drew a red line through Benjamin Norton for advancing the “conspiracy theory” that “US officials had installed the leaders of the current Ukrainian government.” Eight years ago, the Times (2/6/14) reported as straight news the fact that US “diplomats candidly discussed the composition of a possible new government to replace the pro-Russian cabinet of Ukraine’s president.”
For example, the New York Times (4/11/22) claimed that US support for the 2014 “Maidan Revolution” that ousted Ukraine’s democratically elected President Viktor Yanukovych was a “conspiracy theory” being peddled by the Chinese government in support of Russia. The article featured an image with a red line crossing out the face of journalist Benjamin Norton, who was appearing on a Chinese news channel to discuss how the US helped orchestrate the coup. (Norton wrote for FAIR.org frequently from 2015–18.) The evidence he presented—a leaked call initially reported by the BBC in which then–State Department official Victoria Nuland appears to select opposition leader Arseniy Yatsenyuk to be Ukraine’s new prime minister—is something, he noted, that the Times itself has reported on multiple times (2/6/14, 2/7/14).
Not having been asked for comment by the Times, Norton responded in a piece of his own (Multipolarista, 4/14/22), claiming that the newspaper was “acting as a tool of US government information warfare.”
fair.org/...
I'm an old tanker, but I sometimes get to comment on the king of battle (artillery), because they are usually impressive.
This clip doesn't impress me. Here's why.
Watch the film COL Khordaryonok is commenting on a couple times, then come back. 2/
Okay, here's what's happening.
A UKR M777 is in a firing position, obviously getting set up for a shoot.
Gun is unlimbered (not being towed by it's truck), the truck is in the treeline, and there's a few soldiers walking around the vehicle.
Then, INCOMING! The round lands! 3/
Except, the round doesn't land ON the M777. It lands nearby.
W/ towed artillery, a round almost has to land ON the howitzer to destroy it. It doesn't. It may be slightly damaged, or maybe not.
Doesn't appear any UKR soldiers are hurt or wounded. Maybe, but maybe not. 4/
COL K keeps talking, but you see the M777 relimbers to the truck, and moves into the woods. (GOOD job, covered & concealed positions).
Then the clip shows a barrage of rounds, some hitting the woods, most hitting the dirt field.
No indication of any hits on UKR arty. 5/
Artillery dudes have an expression: "pounding dirt."
It can mean going to the firing range and practicing shooting, firing rounds against a mountainside.
It also means "we didn't hit sh#t (the target)."
RUs were pounding dirt.6/
That's not all bad because artillery is an "area fire weapon" in most cases.
That means "fire a bunch of rounds at an area in an attempt to damage, suppress or destroy equipment and kill solders who are congregated."
That's been the role of artillery thru the ages. 7/
In the past, artillery had to be good, but not necessarily precise.
Fire was called by forward observers (FOs) who would provide an estimated grid coordinate of the target and then adjust fire using their radio and binoculars. 8/
But with advanced technology, gun computers, lasers, drones, GPS and targeting systems, artillery has become much more precise.
Usually, you don't need an entire "barrage" that requires pinpoint adjustments from many guns to destroy targets.
There is now precise targeting. 9/
Rounds can be guided in using laser from FOs or aircraft, or even drones.
Some artillery rounds have GPS guidance, where the round is "fired" from the gun but then flies to the target.
The M777 is connected to a fire control computer that calculates wind, weather, data. 10/
One other thing, regarding this particular engagement.
Usually "self-propelled" (SP) guns are valuable to a maneuver force...they can keep up with the fast moving tanks, providing fire. That's what the RU have.
But self-propelled arty has cons as well.11/
SP guns:
1. Need a lot of logistics to keep the track running right. Every time the gun goes off, or the track runs over tough terrain, it rattles the vehicle.
2.SP guns are a bigger target. And crews of SP guns are on the inside. That makes for more casualties. 12/
3. If a round hits near an SP gun, it may not damage the gun, but it may damage/destroy the carrier. That usually doesn't happen with towed cannons.
4. The crew of a towed system is fewer, meaning less casualties. 13/
The M777 is perfect for UKR at this stage.
It's accurate, small crew, light logistics, quick, can hide easily, doesn't have propensity for as much damage. 14/
Bottom line is this:
-UKR can win the artillery fight.
-RU arty can cause a lot of damage when firing against civilian targets as that doesn't require precision.
-The M777 (part of the Stryker Brigade I commanded & the Division I led in combat) is one helluva great gun. 15/
...and COL Khodaryonok should go back to stating how bad RU is doing in this war, and not propagandizing the poor effects of RU artillery against Ukraine. 16/16
• • •
Ukrainian victims of Russia's war have taken to calling their invaders 'orcs'. The word is familiar to JRR Tolkien readers as the name given to the monstrous anthropoids in his epic novel 'The Lord of the Rings'. In all Tolkien's stories of the wars in Middle Earth, orcs are violent, destructive and untrustworthy, wreaking wanton havoc wherever they go. It is not hard to see why the people of Ukraine use this name for the invaders of their land.
But although Tolkien made the word his own, its origins are, as he acknowledged himself, much older. Orcs first appeared in a tenth-century glossary written in Old English (Anglo-Saxon) and, more famously, in line 112 of the Old English poem Beowulf: 'Eotenas ond ylfe ond orcneas'.
Today's 'orcs' wreaking havoc in the towns and villages of Ukraine appear to have this in common with their fictional predecessors
[...]
Today's 'orcs' wreaking havoc in the towns and villages of Ukraine appear to have this in common with their fictional predecessors. Yet there may be something more to Ukrainians calling Russians 'orcs' than it being merely a term of casual abuse. When 'The Lord of the Rings' became a worldwide bestseller it was translated into many languages and inspired countless imitations. In Russia, Kirill Eskov published a retelling of Tolkien's work in 1999 under the title 'The Last Ringbearer'. Eskov's novel is a mirror-image of Tolkien's. It follows a group of elves, led by Gandalf, who wage unremitting war on the peaceful realm of Sauron; eventually Sauron succeeds in defeating them and destroys their treacherous magic, ushering in a new age of progress and prosperity.
'The Last Ringbearer' is not the first or the only inversion of the morality of 'The Lord of the Rings', but it is striking in its readiness to identify with Sauron and his orcs against elves, dwarves and humans. It is hard in 2022 to resist seeing a parallel with Vladimir Putin's vision of Russia assailed by the West and driven to a self-righteous war of survival against a hostile world. On the other side, the people of Ukraine, not deluded by Eskov, label Putin and his troops the orcs they are.
www.spectator.co.uk/...